Do you have a problem with necromancers?

Chapter 115 Unity in the Land of Fertile Land
Looking down from the top of Eagle Castle, Aurora saw that chaos had already broken out in many places and was spreading rapidly around the castle.

She raised her longbow and looked into the distance, where she saw countless figures flying through the air, passing over the city walls and throwing one enemy after another into Eagle Fortress.

"This is troublesome," Aurora sighed with some distress, and began to shoot down the flying monsters.

In a room on the lower level of the castle, Renn saw the unharmed Legion Commander Claudius. This man was quite shrewd; back in High Rock, he refused to let the knights of the Marorne family protect him, only bringing trusted officers with him. Now, in Eagle Keep, he didn't allow strangers to approach his residence, so the vengeful assassins hadn't found any opportunity.

"An enemy attack?" Claudius asked in a deep voice.

“The undead creatures of the Wraith Legion have infiltrated,” Raine replied. “Grand Duke Malorne was unfortunately killed by assassins. I’m glad to see you are alright.”

“Me too,” Claudius said calmly. “And I advise you not to come any closer, because neither of us can confirm the other’s identity.”

“Okay.” Looking at the soldiers pointing their weapons at him, Raine simply shrugged. “You should go upstairs and find Murak. Savages can’t disguise themselves as professional witchers.”

Claudius smiled slightly:
"His neurotic demeanor is indeed difficult to imitate."

Both parties tacitly bid farewell and left. Claudius led his men upstairs, while Ryan continued downstairs.

He suddenly looked to his right, his gaze passing through the corridor window, and saw the flying monsters in the sky outside.

Harpy.

Harpies, as map monsters that roam outside of dungeons, mainly inhabit the Lower Serpent Mountains in the southern part of Changshui Province, which are actually quite far from the Upper Serpent Mountains in the River Bend Province.

Raine finally understood: the reason the savages hadn't sent out troops for so long was that they were waiting for the harpies to arrive.

Faced with these flying monsters, Eagle Castle's towering walls became meaningless, and the vengeful spirits were not afraid of being thrown from a height. Thus, a magical tactic of airdropping vengeful spirits, which did not exist in the original timeline, was developed.

interesting.

From Raine's perspective, the harpy, a crude beast unit, was far less agile than the flying undead units. He even instantly thought of several unit combinations that could maximize the advantages of this airdrop tactic.

Wild Elf King, your idea is very interesting. Now it's mine.

Compared to Renn's leisurely stroll, the knights appeared much more flustered. The troublesome thing about vengeful spirits is their strong defense. It's not the kind of strong defense that makes them impenetrable by steel plate armor and swords, but rather that most attacks are deflected when they hit their spiritual essence.

Although the knights didn't know what "physical damage reduction coefficient" was, they knew these monsters were extremely difficult to kill. Therefore, they quickly changed their strategy, using a shield wall formation to force the vengeful spirits into a corner and block them up, then randomly poking them with their spears through the gaps in the shields. Even if they couldn't kill them, at least they could force the monsters to stop getting any closer.

"The elves are coming! The elves are coming!" someone shouted from behind, and the knights quickly parted to make way for the newcomers.

The two elven guards beside Marquis Fahl, whose names most knights didn't know, had now become their saviors. The wraiths' resistance to magic damage was also considerable, but compared to their absurd physical resistance, it was quite good. Furthermore, with the exaggerated magical power of Ellina and Bersalia, those wraiths that were difficult for the knights to kill quickly melted away like snow under the sun under the bombardment of lightning and fire.

Fatin's magic scimitar was slightly inferior, although it could also drain the moisture from the spirit substance, turning it into a crispy shell like a wafer, or ignite it into a blazing "vengeful torch"... but it was a melee attack.

Melee attacks mean that while the other two elves can stand still and act as artillery emplacements, constantly striking all enemies around them from a distance, Fatin can only use her extraordinary agility to run to the stronger target and deliver a blow before running to the next target. Naturally, her killing efficiency is far inferior.

Furthermore, she was very annoyed by the sense of redemption in the tone of the human knights around her when they cried out, "The elves are here!"—are elves saviors? A thousand years ago, elves were our greatest enemy!

The three heroes joined the siege of the vengeful spirits, greatly relieving the knights' pressure. Aurora, meanwhile, sat atop the castle, continuously shooting down harpies from the sky, keeping the enemy at bay.

Only Dia was unable to do anything. She couldn't reveal her true dragon form in front of so many people, so she could only follow Renn around to inspect the situation... and then she discovered that she couldn't understand the battlefield situation at all. She could only observe that vengeful spirits were still falling from the sky, and the knights' killing speed was far from keeping up with the replenishment speed of these spirits. The number of undead creatures in the castle was increasing.

"Raine, are we going to lose?" Dia asked anxiously. "Should I transform into a dragon?"

"Lose?" Renn was a little confused. "We're guaranteed to win, okay?"

"But..." Dia hesitated, then finally couldn't help but ask, "But there are more and more enemies!"

"Want to know?" Renn said slowly, "In exchange for six months of maid service."

Dia felt an urge to faint on the spot: What time is it, and you're still using this to blackmail me!

She had privately calculated that, according to the verbal agreements the two had reached, she had been Ryan's maid for almost 10 months and would have to continue for another 10 months or so.

If this were to last another six months... But with the battlefield situation so critical right now, Dia is really restless if she can't find out the answer soon.

Ok?
Suddenly, the dragon maid had a flash of inspiration and realized the key to the problem:
Whenever my maid's contract is about to expire, this guy will inevitably use all sorts of shameless tricks to lure me into extending it. He'll extend it by several months, while I have to endure it day by day—this approach is definitely not going to work.

I should also use similar tactics to proactively shorten the time limit! For example, "Raine, do you want me to transform into a dragon to help you? In exchange, you can offer me a six-month time limit!"
With this in mind, Dia was no longer afraid of extending the maid's term, because she was certain that Rein would need her in many ways in the future, and the extended term would eventually be shortened.

"Okay," she said with a smile. "Then please tell me."

Raine looked at her smile, somewhat puzzled. What's wrong with this girl? Is she addicted to being my maid?

However, as long as the Dragon Princess remained by his side, what she was thinking was actually unimportant. Therefore, Renn generously revealed the answer:

"Because it is very difficult to transform a vengeful spirit."

"Is it difficult?" Dia vaguely realized something.

“To transform the dead into vengeful spirits rather than ghosts, one must subject them to prolonged and inhumane torture before death, along with a continuous replenishment of necromantic magic,” Raine said calmly. “Sufficient torture will make the vengeful spirits resistant to most types of damage. The cost is that the birth of each vengeful spirit has an inexhaustible cycle, and the Wild Elf King absolutely cannot accept consuming so many vengeful spirits in Eagle Hold—his goal is the subsequent Fertile Lands.”

Dia pondered for a moment, then said:
"So even if he could kill us all at Eagle's Keep, he wouldn't choose to do it, because he has more to deal with than just us..."

“It is the empire behind the Reach,” Raine concluded. “The wildling army has no chance of permanently occupying the Reach; they are here to plunder. If we completely annihilate the Reach coalition here, when they build their ships and set foot on the Fertile Lands, they will have to deal with the Seventh Legion of Warriors and the Nineteenth Raven Legion, which have marched from the South. Therefore, the Wild Elf King must leave behind enough troops.”

To paraphrase Tian Ji's horse racing strategy, you can't use your best horse against your opponent's worst in the first round. Dia hadn't heard this story before, but that didn't stop her from understanding what Renn meant, and she nodded, saying:

"In other words, as long as we ensure that our morale does not collapse, we don't need to worry about being completely encircled and annihilated."

"I estimate that by nightfall at the latest, the other side will have to find a way to withdraw their troops," Renn said leisurely. "The real troublesome enemy will then officially appear."

A truly troublesome enemy? Dia was somewhat confused and puzzled, but she had no intention of extending the maid's term any further, so she simply kept quiet and didn't ask.

Raine's prediction was largely correct. Shortly after sunset, as darkness fell completely, the vengeful spirits in the castle finally began to retreat under the cover of night.

Ignoring the knights' desperate struggle, they rushed from the inside to the top of the city wall and then jumped down without hesitation.

Chasing the undead in the darkness was tantamount to suicide, so the Eagle Fortress crew had no choice but to abandon their counterattack, rest on the spot, and take stock of their casualties.

The death toll was not high, but the number of wounded was considerable. This was mainly because many knights were unaware of the vengeful spirits' difficulty in being killed, resulting in them being injured on their first encounter.

As fully armed knights carrying shields gradually arrived, the number of casualties was brought under control.

However, the noble alliance suffered a major casualty: the assassination of Grand Duke Malorne.

All three leaders of the allied forces were assassinated, with only the Grand Duke dying. After all, with so many Reach nobles under his command, and such a diverse and numerous group, it was inevitable that he would be infiltrated by vengeful spirits.

But his death has made many things complicated.

Claudius quickly found Raine after the war and suggested that the nobles of the Reach should be informed as soon as possible that the Grand Duke of Malorne had been assassinated by a disguised vengeful assassin, in order to prevent unrest among the nobles.

Renn agreed, and the two summoned the nobles to the castle courtyard to announce the news of the Grand Duke's unfortunate death.

The nobles of the bountiful lands were naturally filled with righteous indignation and demanded a counterattack as soon as possible to avenge Grand Duke Malorne.

"The Reachers show no mercy to their enemies," said Earl Tanfur. "Your Excellency Marquis Fahl, Your Excellency Commander of the Pentorai Legion, since the Wildlings' Wraith Legion was able to assassinate the Grand Duke in the castle, they can also, once they have truly set foot in the Reach, secretly and silently slit the throats of each of us on any night. Unless you are confident that you can outmaneuver the Grand Duke in terms of security, you will all face certain death! We must fight back with all our might to protect ourselves!"

"That's right!" the nobles of the bountiful lands shouted. "Attack the Serpent Mountains! Kill the Wild Elf King!"

Renn calmly watched the nobles shouting for war, while Dia silently covered her surprised, open mouth beside him.

She remembered that in the beginning, when these wealthy nobles arrived at Eagle Hold, they began to garrison the area. Many were unwilling to send troops to attack the Serpent Mountains, and even when Raine clearly stated that it was necessary to rescue Raven Hold, they only perfunctorily sent militia to join the ranks… Compared to the collectively fervent and belligerent atmosphere they had now, they were completely different people. After a moment of careful thought, she quickly found her answer.

Before this, the nobles of the Fertile Lands only cared about stopping the savage army south of the Raging Tide River, and they didn't care at all how badly the Faher family was destroyed.

But now that the Grand Duke has unfortunately died, if the noble alliance falls apart as a result, it will probably be unable to resist the barbarian army's northward advance. Therefore, the nobles of the Fertile Lands have begun to actively volunteer for the war, probably in order to win over those groups that have already begun to waver...

Dia turned her gaze to the opposite side, where the nobles of the Riverlands stood, each with a calm expression and not uttering a word, seemingly neither saddened nor angry by the death of the Grand Duke.

Their expressions... Dia was all too familiar with them, because she often saw similar expressions on Rein's face, expressions of calculating, planning, and weighing the pros and cons.

"Excuse me," a Riverlands nobleman stepped forward and asked, "how did the assassin who killed the Grand Duke get into Eagle's Castle?"

Dia didn't recognize his identity, or rather, she didn't recognize any of the Riverlands nobles present.

"The murderer is a vengeful spirit." As the lord of Eaglehold, Renn said expressionlessly, "The enemy commanded harpies to capture the vengeful spirit, which was then airdropped over the city walls to infiltrate the city. We believe that this vengeful spirit seized an opportunity to murder the Baron of Clearspring, then transformed into his appearance, and finally infiltrated the Grand Duke's private meeting to carry out the assassination."

"The magical advisor responsible for protecting the Grand Duke was drinking downstairs because he was not allowed to attend private meetings. When the assassin made his move, the Grand Duke's guards tried their best to stop him, but unfortunately, swords and blades were completely ineffective against vengeful spirits, a fact that I believe has been confirmed by everyone."

“We meant no offense,” the other party said in a deep voice, “but you and the legion commander were not assassinated, only the Grand Duke unfortunately perished?”

"What do you mean?" The nobles of the bountiful lands were agitated, but Raine simply raised his hands to signal everyone to stop arguing, and then calmly said, "Both the legion commander and I were assassinated, but my elven guards happened to be right next to me at the time, and the legion commander never allows any potential threat to get close to him."

“It’s not that we don’t trust your account, Marquis Fahl,” said the Riverlands nobleman. “But the Grand Duke’s death cannot be concluded based solely on your word. We need to return to High Rock as soon as possible, inform the Marorne family of this matter, and elect a new Grand Duke before considering the defense of the Fertile Lands.”

See the picture poorly.

The nobles of the Fertile Lands volunteered for the war not to avenge the Grand Duke, but simply because the savage army was threatening their territories. As for the nobles of the Riverlands, even if the savage army reached the lower reaches of the Long River, they had High Rock and the Nightshade Legion to hold them off. Now that the Grand Duke, who had driven them to fulfill their vassal duties, was dead, they had no reason to continue participating in the war.

Dia took in the retreat on the faces of these nobles and finally understood who Rein meant by "the greatest enemy".

These are the hypocritical nobles who appear virtuous on the surface but are actually driven by self-interest.

The situation reached a stalemate. Renn and Claudius exchanged glances, both realizing that the Riverlands nobles had likely reached a consensus and were determined to withdraw from the war.

The reason border provinces are called border provinces is because the empire's voice and influence here are quite limited. As long as the nobles don't openly rebel, even if they openly defy the royal family, there's nothing the empire can do. The Grand Duke can still use his connections and skills to drive the nobles, but Renne and Claudius are completely powerless.

The meeting was chaotic and noisy until late at night, and showed no signs of stopping even past midnight. The people of the Fertile Lands accused the people of the Riverlands of lacking a sense of honor and loyalty to their lord, while the people of the Riverlands retorted that they were also responsible for the Grand Duke's death in the Fertile Lands. This serious accusation directly led to Renn being unable to step down, so he proposed a duel with the Riverlands nobles who had spoken. Claudius quickly stepped forward to stop him and mediate.

Early the next morning, some of the Riverlands nobles had already impatiently led their troops away. Those who remained were mostly related to the nobles of the Bountiful Lands by marriage, and were too embarrassed to directly break ties. However, it was unlikely that they would send troops to counterattack the Serpent Mountain Range.

“I will request support from the capital,” Claudius told Raine. “Without the help of the Riverlands, we don’t have enough manpower to resist the savage invasion. We need the support of the Southern Legion.”

"The court council is unlikely to approve the Southern Legion's volunteer proposal," Raine said rather tactfully. "The ministers don't care about the border provinces, and His Majesty... has exceptional strategic resolve."

This was something that left Claudius speechless. Logically, the Imperial Legion should be the Emperor's sword and shield, protecting him from external enemies and internal threats. But in reality, the Emperor felt that the commanders of the Imperial Legion didn't respect him enough, while the Legion thought that the Emperor was incompetent yet demanding, not even as good as a hair on the head of his father and grandfather. Why should they obey him?

Claudius even maliciously speculated that His Majesty might actually be hoping for the Nightbane Legion to be utterly destroyed, ideally with all the lower-ranking officers of the Legion Commander's faction killed off. Then he could legitimately send his own confidants to take over the Nightbane Legion. As for the casualties of the soldiers—in the eyes of that military-illiterate His Majesty, it was probably enough to just put up an advertisement in the capital and have loyal citizens enthusiastically enlist.

In reality, the capital's pool of high-quality soldiers had long been depleted. Men preferred to be vote-getters rather than legion soldiers, and women had even abandoned their imperial identity, becoming "Amazons"... In short, Claudius, like most legion commanders, while despising the emperor, had to grit his teeth and respect imperial authority. Knowing that requests for help would likely go unanswered, he still had to follow the procedures.

“Raine,” Claudius suddenly said, “you should already have a plan for the current situation, right?”

"Why do you think I have a solution?" Ryan countered.

“If Eagle Keep cannot be defended, the Fertile Lands will certainly perish, but your family territory will be destroyed before that,” Claudius said with certainty. “If you had no other options, you would not be so calm and collected now.”

“I don’t really have any solutions either.” Ryan sighed deeply. “The enemy’s strength is what it is; we would need to gather the equivalent of the entire River Bend province’s military force to fight them. Why do you think I have a plan?”

Claudius didn't say anything, just smiled, and turned to leave.

The legion commander completely disbelieved Rein's claim of being "powerless." After all, looking at the man's resume and life story, whether in the capital or within his family, he always miraculously managed to escape danger.

He definitely has a plan, he just doesn't want to confront me about it.

Claudius wasn't in a hurry. For the Nightshade Legion, the Fertile Lands were the one they couldn't afford to lose. At worst, they could abandon Eagle Hold and retreat to the north bank of the Raging Tide River. The savage army wouldn't be able to build enough boats to cross the river in a short time, so he had plenty of time to come up with a plan.

After the legion commander left, Dia said anxiously:
"Raine! If the Riverlands nobles leave, the allied forces will lose nearly half their strength!"

“I know.” Raine remained calm as he explained, “They are, after all, nobles from the Riverlands. It’s unrealistic to expect them to do their best to protect the Fertile Lands. Besides, the Grand Duke summoned them here not primarily to defend against the wildlings.”

"Not to defend against savages?" Dia didn't react for a moment. "Then what is it for?"

“Go and summon all the nobles of the Fertile Lands,” Raine said without answering the question. After a moment of contemplation, he suddenly gave the order.

----------

In the castle hall, the wealthy nobles stood silently, listening to Marquis Fahel speak eloquently on the stage.

"Grand Duke Malorne has a son and a daughter. His son, Kyle Malorne, is in the East, adopted by the current duke of the prestigious Bolot family. His daughter, Marsan Malorne, is married and should be living in High Rock with her husband at the moment."

"Now that the Grand Duke has passed away unexpectedly without having designated an heir, the question of whether the ducal position should be passed to his son Kyle or his daughter Martha has become an urgent issue."

“The Riverlands nobles undoubtedly support Kyle, so their rush back to the Riverlands is probably intended to go to the East and bring Kyle back to High Rock as quickly as possible to inherit his father’s title.” At this point, Raine paused subtly for a moment, “However, this goes against the Grand Duke’s wishes, because it is well known that the Grand Duke was extremely fond of his daughter Marshan.”

The nobles of the bountiful land exchanged suspicious glances.

This is undoubtedly a lie. It is true that the Grand Duke loves his daughter Marshan, but sending his son Kyle to the East was to establish a father-son relationship with the Duke of Bolot, which is standard practice for grooming an heir.

However, Kyle had a closer relationship with the Riverlands, and his rise to power did not align with the interests of the nobles of the Fertile Lands. Martha, on the other hand, had married the eldest son of House Tanfield in Deepwood, making her a true "Reach daughter-in-law." There was no doubt that everyone would prefer to pledge allegiance to a duchess with the Reach mark.

After a long silence and deep thought, Count Tale of Pingshui City suddenly spoke up and asked:
"Was someone notifying people of the Grand Duke's assassination attempt via raven?"

“Unfortunately, because of the harpy attack, all the ravens in the castle were frightened away,” Renn said slowly. “That is to say, apart from those who fought in Eagle Castle last night, no one knows about this news.”

“In that case, if the Riverlands nobles who left the city this morning encounter some unexpected problems and are unable to cross the Raging Tide River,” Count Talley stroked his mustache and smiled, “then Kyle Malone, who is in the East, will not know that his father has passed away.”

The nobles of the bountiful lands finally understood, their minds were instantly opened, and they began to pool their wisdom and offer suggestions:
"We need to summon Martha Malorne to Eagle Hold as soon as possible so that she can officially assume the position of Grand Duke of the Reach in front of her father's corpse!"

"The Riverlands nobles in the castle also need to be brought under control as soon as possible and forced to swear allegiance to the Duke of Marshan!"

"Relying solely on the Raging Tide River is not enough. To get back to the Riverlands from here, we must pass through the Fertile Lands. Please write back to your tribes and inform them that no one from the Riverlands should be allowed to pass through, and they must not be allowed to obtain a single raven!"

"We also need to win the support of the Empire. As long as His Majesty the Emperor publicly recognizes Massan's succession to the title, even if the Riverlands nobles have objections, they will be powerless to change the situation!"

"Gentlemen! Gentlemen!" Earl Tanfol shouted, "Before we begin the actual operation, we must reach a consensus that no one here will leak information beforehand."

The nobles immediately fell silent.

Intermarriage between nobles from the Reach and the Riverlands was quite common. Even nobles who didn't intend to reveal the secret couldn't guarantee that others around them wouldn't, so they could only keep quiet and suspiciously observe their surroundings.

“Marquis Fahr,” Earl Tanfol said in a deep voice, “for the honor, interests, and lives of the people of the Fertile Lands, this matter must not be compromised. We now need an iron-fisted leader to guide us and ensure that any noble who dares to betray the Fertile Lands will be punished with terrible and dreadful consequences for such a despicable and shameful act.”

Renn simply smiled and said:

"Our Faher family has protected the Fertile Land for hundreds of years, and we will never allow anyone to harm its interests, whether they are damned savages or disgusting traitors... Please rest assured, if anyone dares to leak this information, I guarantee that he will never return to the Fertile Land alive."

The nobles of the Fertile Lands bowed their heads in agreement. They finally realized that they were on the territory of the Fahel family, their army was entirely dependent on the Fahel family for supplies, and even the Raging Tide River, which they had to cross to return to the Fertile Lands, was completely controlled by the Fahel family's fleet.

In other words, there is only one path laid out before everyone.

(End of this chapter)